With Rob & Amber's back to back 1st place finishes (to quote Lynn, "I just threw up a little in my mouth there") they have now the best racing average for the first two legs in the history of the Amazing Race.

Not only do the break the record of Kris & Jon, Eric & Jeremy, BJ & Tyler and Tyler & James.

But for the first time, Eric & Jeremy no longer have the best average performance record at every leg of the Amazing Race.

First and foremost, I must say that it was disappointing to see Kevin and Drew bow out of the race. But it was more or less expected because they made lots of mistakes, wrong decisions etc. Looks like they have not learnt from their past mistakes as seen in their previous race. As the saying goes, history repeats itself. This saying seems to never 'disprove' itself but only reinforces it. Anyway, it is certainly sad to see such a talented team leave the competition, but life has to go on....

On hindsight, Rob and Amber were simply marvellous! Two first place finishings on the Amazing Race all stars is an achievement in itself. Hats off to this celebrity couple! Based on that, I think they will go far in this race.....

Teams had an 18 hour Pit Stop. For safety reasons, the production staff doesn’t allow teams to drive in hazardous conditions at night. While at the Pit Stop Drew received oxygen 4 times to combat altitude sickness.

Teams leave the Pit Stop, at Mirador in the Cotopaxi National Park in the order they arrived.

Teams are provided $487.00 (I swear that's what I heard both from Oswald and David), but damn that's a lot.

Teams are directed to travel by air over 2400 miles to Santiago, Chile. When they land they will travel 12 miles by taxi to the corporate headquarters of Codelco, the world’s largest cooper mining company.

Over the rough terrain, Charla & Mirna get stuck, and David & Mary tow them free.

Kevin & Drew still have the same vehicle without a tire on its front passenger side. They get immediately stuck, and try for several minutes to free themselves. They end up getting the vehicle so stuck that it isn’t feasible to change the tire.

It appears in interviews after the race that Kevin & Drew were given a penalty for causing damage to their vehicle. And they had to make an honest attempt to use it before they could switch to another vehicle and took a 15 minute penalty.

Which is fair in my book. Choosing to drive on a rim for 5 miles, is unacceptable when one could try and change the tire first. And I think that means that John Vito & Jill were at least slightly more then 15 minutes behind Kevin and Drew.

Roadblock: “Who has an eye for detail?”Roadblock-Pay a visit to the boardroom on the ground floor. There are details in the room that will lead you to the “answer” you will need. When you think you have the “answer”, write it down and show it to the security guard in the lobby-if you are correct e will hand you your next clue.

In this roadblock, that person must go the building’s ground floor, and search the boardroom for letters of the alphabet that are on display. What teams must figure out is that the majority of these letters when unscrambled will spell out one of the ten destinations inscribed on the plaques hanging on the wall. Then once they think they have solved the puzzle, they must show their answer to the security guard. If they are correct he will hand them their next clue.

Team members that do the roadblock are: Joyce, Eric, Kandice, Bill, Kevin, Ian, Charla, Mary, Amber and Oswald.

The word they need to unscramble and find is Chuquicamata a cooper mine.

In By Hand: Teams must choose one of these two ton tires (yes tires), and then properly align the bolts and washers to finish securing the tire to the truck. When they are finished the foreman will give them their next clue.

In By Machine: Each team member must take a turn driving one of these huge front loaders to transfer gravel. Once a team has covered the yellow line on this stick, the foreman will give them their next clue.

Teams must then pick one of these marked vehicles and drive themselves 71 miles to the entrance of the landscape know as the Valley of the Moon. The sharp turns and the shifting sand require that the teams drive no more then 40k/ph . Once they exit the Valley of the Moon they can return to driving 50k/ph as they search for this place--The Valley of the Dead. Which is the Pit Stop for this leg of the race.

There is a lot of driving shuffling in this final part of the episode. From Teri & Ian dropping from 6th to 8th just because they couldn’t find the marked cars.

To several teams making a wrong turn after the valley of the moon (Uchenna & Joyce, Dustin & Kandice, Charla & Mirna, David & Mary, and Kevin & Drew).

But the biggest error, was Kevin & Drew not properly reading the driving instructions and driving 40k/ph from the entrance of the Valley of the Moon until they reached the Pit Stop.

Rob & AmberAgain finish the leg in first, but unlike last week where they ran a very consistently strong episode, here they were saved by a mid leg equalizer. This episode also featured the most arguing we have ever seen this team do within itself. First the positive. This team has hustle, they manage to almost always get better speeds out of taxi drivers. They manage to make smart detour choices and they work very well together. This is what put them back in 1st and kept them there. The negative. Rob doesn't seem to understand that sometimes the risk isn't worth it. On the clips we see that going to Calama, He wants to take a flight 20 minutes later and avoid the wait off the plane. It takes considerable persuasion from Amber to get him to realize this is a mistake (I will be very curious next week to see what a difference 20 minutes will make in their arrival time at the Pit Stop). We also get to see them rush out of the airport and try to take the earliest flight o Santiago. Now normally most tasks wouldn't be open this late (or earlier) but it was. But the flight. was late and put them toward the back needlessly. Knowing when to risk this type of travel is very important. Because it can kill a team, and take them out of the running. This early in the season is not when that risk is necessary. An uneven leg, but where the half that mattered they performed very well in.

Oswald & DannyManaged almost he same exact type of leg as Rob & Amber. The only two differences is that the team has less hustle, and they also don't seem to make a glaring error like Rob for late travel arrangements. They managed their tasks fairly well, especially at the detour for a team that isn't that physical. Nice job, after having an equalizer save you.

Joe & BillA very good leg, with one serious mistake. They made the safe travel arrangement because at that time the other options weren't available. They were one of the faster teams to figure out the roadblock, and they drove through the Chile well. But at the Detour they make a serious error in not following the clues instruction. This is a terrible error that had no reason to happen. Because we even have it on tape where they read it outloud. An error like that at the wrong time can kill a team.

Eric & DanielleA good leg with one big problem and one very minor one. The positive. Eric & Danielle used their down time to research the location of the Roadblock, a smart, smart choice. They hustled throughout all stages of this episode (something they do well at). But Eric made 2 serious errors' while trying to complete the roadblock. He was the 2cd person to have the right idea (he was simply missing a letter) in the proper clue. But he didn't try it anyway. In season 9 when he thought he wasn't done rebuilding the statue he got a judges opinion anyway. Here he didn't. And this was a mistake. And thelonger he got the more frustrated it appeared he got. And when he found an H, he should have immediately got it. But it took him a little bit to do it. We also see that he seems to not only be driving, but navigating as well. That eventually could bit him on the ass. I think we need to see Danielle step up and do one or the other. With having trouble getting it into 4 wheel drive, Eric stales (apparently) allowing the Guido's to pass.

Uchenna & JoyceWith location help from Eric & Danielle, they managed to get to the cluebox first, but took the longest time out of any team to get the clue. Joyce seemed to be paying no attention to theother racers (and after a while, you start looking at what they are doing). Then they make another huge error. When you are next to last, never, never give the answer to another team. Period. They performed the detour very well, considering they were one of the last ones there. And most likely would have placed higher, except fr briefly getting lost finding the Valley of the Dead. But times of separation between 3rd and 5th is probably 2-3 minutes.

Dustin & KandiceLadies congratulations on an excellent performance at the roadblock. For a team that could often provide "blond moments" in season ten (most notable listening to crickets for their next clue ), Dustin kicked ass and took names. But the physical nature of the detour killed them, taking them to next to last. The compounded this problem by getting lost. But, wisely sought out local confirmation. This allowed them to correct their navigation error, and since every team behind them made the same mistake going even further in the wrong direction this helped gain them several spots.

Teri & IanOy What went wrong. Terrible performance at he roadblock, and without actually solving the clue we have no idea how long they would have taken. They were slow off the 2cd plane and one of the last teams at the detour. But they did okay in completing the detour. But the simply act of finding the marked cars cost them two positions. They also took the wrong turn, but once they saw that D & K were going the other way the y quickly turned around pushing them past two teams that were still going the wrong way. But at least personality wise, this team has shown is handling the stress much better then in season 3.

Charla & MirnaBoy these two need to calm the hell down. They also need to start actually navigating in two sections of this leg, they depended on Mary & David to guide them. They also used a cab to escort them, paying (according to video's) $200. This is the 2cd leg in a row where they have spent almost all their money on getting navigation help (and they still have averages 8th each time). Ladies your wasting your money. You need to start building a nest egg. Charla also depended on Mary to provide the answer to the roadblock clue. As it is now, unless they start actually using their won skills I can't see this team lasting much longer.

David & MaryI like that Mary is being more assertive, but get over this alliance crap. The only successful long term alliance this show has ever had is the alliance of Tyler & James and Rob & Kim. And that was a n alliance that never hurt the other team. You didn't want for another, you didn't get mad if you got passed, and you didn't lose time helping. If you aren't good enough to make it primarily on your own, get off the tube and get eliminated. Mary did do an excellent job in figuring out the roadblock clue (probably the 2cd fastest), but her navigation is awful. Turn right because it has more words (WTF is that for a reason). They also did poorly at the detour, by not taking care in how they put the nuts and washers on. This team could and should be gone shortly.

Kevin & DrewWell last week I thought you were already dead. But surprisingly you guys had some spring in your step and hustled when youhad to. I don't think this team could have ever made it much more then 2 or so more legs, but they did okay for the most part here. But they commit a cardinal sin, and didn't pat attention to the addition information concerning the speed limit. With trucks going 10 kilometers per hour faster, the three teams behind you absolutely are going to be able to pass you. They also got lost. Without that, they might have survived. But with both mistakes they were toast. And for being favorite sons of the show, Drew's reaction on being last was one of the worst (if not the worst) in the show's history. Way to be graceful.

So a considerable improvement at this stage for Oswald & Danny. and Teri & Ian to a lessor degree.

Eric & Danielle are doing better then what the average of their placements would show. And the rest have moderate increases (Uchenna & Joyce & Rob & Amber), or minor decreases (Joe & Bill, Dustin & Kandice).

Only Kevin & drew and even more so Charla & Mirna are doing significant worse performance wise.

MSWOOD, there is one major problem in your report and you already cited disbelief when you wrote it. The money for the leg was either $48 or $49, depending onwhich team you believe as a source. $487 would be absurb given what they needed to spend it on(one taxi from Quito airport to Plaza San Francisco, the $10 entrance fee to Cotopaxi National Park, a few snacks in Miami airport). The money is carefully calculated by the Amazing Race designers and they want the teams to have no more and no less than is necessary. They do not want to encourage more "leading taxi" opportunities on film.

Your spelling of Calama is perfect.

POSTSCRIPTIt is clear from later postings that I am talking about a different leg(episode #1). I was confused (not the first time and hardly the last) and my entire comments above are about episode #1 when they should have been about episode #2. My apologies, MSWOOD.

Charla & Mirna in video's where Mirna is crying talks about how she paid the cab $200. So it possible that it was $287. Since they spent all their money from the previous leg. I am hoping some one else was able to hear more clearly.

Its mentioned by both Oswald & Danny and David & Mary. I could see it actually being 187, or 287. But I here 487 every time.

I just checked TWOP and thats also what a poster there heard.

Now in previous seasons the producers have given high amoutns on one leg, and practically nothing in another (when they did have expenses), so it might be a way of testing how well they save.

For expenses they had 24 miles of cab fare in Santiago going from the airport to the El cenrro district to locate Codelco.

They also had the cab ride in Calama to the Copper mie (I haven't looked up how fare that was). And of ocurse a little is always provided for food & water. So yeah, I imagine that even 187 is a lot of money.

MSWOOD, there is one major problem in your report and you already cited disbelief when you wrote it. The money for the leg was either $48 or $49, depending onwhich team you believe as a source. $487 would be absurb given what they needed to spend it on(one taxi from Quito airport to Plaza San Francisco, the $10 entrance fee to Cotopaxi National Park, a few snacks in Miami airport). The money is carefully calculated by the Amazing Race designers and they want the teams to have no more and no less than is necessary. They do not want to encourage more "leading taxi" opportunities on film.

Yep, I watched some and had trouble with the sound on others. It seems like the ones shot while underway in their cars the soundman is up front and you can hardly hear the person in back. I heard Mirna LOUD and clear...did I tell you that I was deaf?

With Rob & Amber's back to back 1st place finishes (to quote Lynn, "I just threw up a little in my mouth there") they have now the best racing average for the first two legs in the history of the Amazing Race.

Not only do the break the record of Kris & Jon, Eric & Jeremy, BJ & Tyler and Tyler & James.

But for the first time, Eric & Jeremy no longer have the best average performance record at every leg of the Amazing Race.

My god, to think what type of record they could set with this season.

Hopefully by tomorrow I will have the full report done.

But according to Puddin's boot list (which has been two for two) Rob and Amber will only be with us for two more eps; then it is off to the the blue waters and warm sands of Ack a pull co!

Well in all honesty, I am actually enjoying Rob & Amber a lot more here then in season 7.

Tehy aren't getting benefits of being recognized and helped that others aren't. He isn't quite as cocky and we see (especially inthis week's clips) that Amber isn't always a "yes" girl who seems to have nothing to add.

Well in all honesty, I am actually enjoying Rob & Amber a lot more here then in season 7.

Tehy aren't getting benefits of being recognized and helped that others aren't. He isn't quite as cocky and we see (especially inthis week's clips) that Amber isn't always a "yes" girl who seems to have nothing to add.

I'll second that. AMBER is actually quite refreshing. Her pulling ROB down to earth in the Santiago airport scene where Rob wanted to take a 20 minute later flight so that there would be less congestion getting off the plane at Calama was priceless; she told him that were going on the plane with everyone else. It was clear that he could bitch, but they were going to do what she decided. Also, the airport scene where a new agent line opens up and ERIC grabs it and ROB complains and AMBER tells him to pipe down because he would have down the identical thing is a gem!